


Scar-stained

by arabmorgan



Category: Produce 101 (TV), Wanna One (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Police, Denial of Feelings, Developing Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-22
Updated: 2018-11-01
Packaged: 2019-08-06 00:03:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16377602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arabmorgan/pseuds/arabmorgan
Summary: All Jihoon wanted to do was to prove himself as the best junior cop in the city, and it would have happened too — except Woojin just had to show up and smash all his plans to bits.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm very sorry to say that I know next to nothing about how law enforcement works in pretty much any country, so if any part of this is factually bullshit that's why.

Not many people had the luxury of fulfilling their childhood dream.

Even fewer had the distinct misfortune of being thoroughly disillusioned after fulfilling said childhood dream.

Jihoon was sadly not part of the majority.

He had always expected to see eyes widening in respect or even awe as he stepped out of his cruiser, chest out, ready to take on the crooks of the city. He had expected smiles and cheers, and perhaps even a little bit of swooning. Instead, time after time, he was met with cool looks of amusement or cynicism, or even worse, disappointment.

“Are you even old enough to be out here on your own, kid?” a cop from another precinct had scoffed at him once, when Jihoon had flashed his badge before stepping past the yellow tape and into the crime scene.

It was difficult to want to help people who never had any faith in him at all.

It was a curse, this baby face of his.

No matter how much Jihoon scowled, or scrunched his eyebrows, or sneered at every friendly overture, Detective Hwang always had a kind smile for him. Officer Kang was forever forgoing any mention of his rank and greeting him with a painfully perky, “Hi, Jihoonie!” that always made him want to shrivel up inside. Captain Yoon never stopped lecturing him on embracing his strengths and growing to his full potential instead of dwelling on his shortcomings.

But Jihoon didn’t care about the strengths of being _cute_. He wasn’t going to get anywhere in the hierarchy by being _adorable_.

Sure, Detective Ha was tiny and could possibly have passed for cute – but only in an alternate universe (and maybe not even then). There was something feral about him, the way a single derisive curl of his lip could make Officer Kang slink away with his virtual tail between his legs. His tongue was practically a knife in itself, and everyone lived in fear of getting on the wrong side of his utterly cutting sense of humour.

Jihoon idolised the man, and was simultaneously scared to death of him. Not that the two of them had ever even exchanged more than five words with each other – but still, Jihoon could dream.

One day he would bust a case so big that everyone would _have_ to look past his sweet-eyed visage to his unmatchable cop skills just beneath. Detective Ha would immediately put in a request to have Jihoon as his partner. Officer Kang would fumble with his mug while passing Jihoon in the corridor and say in a tone of hushed respect, “Officer Park.” Detective Hwang would nod solemnly at him, acknowledging them both as equals.

And Captain Yoon, well – Jihoon doubted that anything he did would ever stop the Captain from nagging, but he supposed he didn’t really mind it all that much anyway.

And so that was Jihoon’s life goal – the reason he only glared mutely at Detective Ong’s back every time he was told to _stay back_. The reason he swallowed every acidic word burning on the back of his tongue each time he entered an interrogation room and his witness raised a skeptical brow at the sight of him. The reason he never left the station till the wee hours of the night, reading through his fellow officers’ reports with the furrowed brows of someone trying to commit an entire textbook to memory.

And it would all have paid off too – Jihoon was nothing if not stubborn once he’d set his mind on something after all – except a particular newcomer transferred to their precinct one balmy spring morning and smashed all of Jihoon’s hopes and dreams to bits.

* * *

“Park!” Detective Ha snapped as he stalked past the row of desks at which Jihoon was seated.

“Yes, Detective,” Park Woojin all but chirped, leaping to his feet in less than a second as if he had spent all his life waiting for this single summons. Jihoon ducked his head, glaring at his screen as he heard the other Park’s footsteps hurry past behind him, catching up to Detective Ha before the older man reached the exit of the station.

No other words were needed, not for a rookie who had been making rounds with the famously temperamental detective since day one, for no other reason than the fact that Detective Ha had been the only experienced cop in the station the day he had transferred over.

“You have potential, kid,” was all Detective Ha had snorted when they had returned, immediately peeling off from the bewildered newbie in the direction of Captain Yoon’s office.

Woojin had halted in his tracks, looking lost for a moment until his eyes swept past Jihoon, who was not-so-surreptitiously peering over his monitor at the new guy. In an instant, Woojin’s face brightened, a tentative smile transforming his expression from something like a glare into something that could almost be termed as playful.

Jihoon’s eyes widened, alarmed at being caught, and he hurriedly dragged his gaze back down to his screen – but it was too late.

“You’re…Jihoon, right?” Woojin sounded nothing less than delighted, and it was all Jihoon could do to stop himself from rolling his eyes. “Do you remember me? We were at the academy together, right?”

They had been. They’d slogged through training courses together, and suffered through mind-numbing exams with a shared, single-minded intensity. It wasn’t like they’d been best friends or anything, but as a group, they’d shared some fairly formative experiences.

But all Jihoon could hear at that moment was the appraising interest in Detective Ha’s voice as he said, _You have potential, kid_. Jihoon had never even gotten so much as a sideways glance from the man in five months.

He raised his brows, lips twisting downwards in a scoff. “Yeah, and?”

Woojin faltered, his already-small smile fading into nothingness. “Oh, uh,” he said haltingly. “I just thought – it was nice to see a familiar face, so I thought I’d come say hi. You must be busy though.”

Jihoon felt like he ought to be feeling bad, but all that filled his mind was an ugly, dark satisfaction as he sniffed, already looking away from Woojin dismissively. “Super busy,” he said flatly, and he glared at his computer screen until Woojin retreated ever so slowly, as if he was still hoping for Jihoon to change his mind with every step. Even the sound of his polished shoes dragging on the tile sounded disappointed.

Perhaps he shouldn’t have been so harsh on Woojin, Jihoon thought that night, as he stared at the ceiling in the darkness of his room. It wasn’t as if he had known any better; it wasn’t as if he had intentionally snared Jihoon’s idol in his greedy, grasping fingers; it wasn’t as if he was responsible for Jihoon’s catastrophic failure to be born with an intimidating face.

But the next morning, Detective Ha snagged the new kid to accompany him on patrol once more, before anyone else could even get a word in, and that was that.

Jihoon officially hated Park Woojin.

* * *

Jihoon turned 22 just a few weeks after Woojin’s transfer.

It was a quiet day. Captain Yoon clapped him on the back and wished him a happy birthday in the morning as he came in, and so did Detective Hwang when they bumped into each other in the pantry. Detective Ong, whom Jihoon worked with the most often, bought him a slice of cake from Starbucks even though they weren’t supposed to be on break yet. Other than that, no one else at the station seemed to be aware of the significance of the day.

Jihoon didn’t mind. He didn’t need his colleagues to throw some sort of childish party for him. This felt like a far more adult-like way to spend his birthday, and that was just fine with him.

Woojin sidled up to his desk near dinnertime, when Jihoon was munching on a burger while scrolling through his phone. His approach surprised Jihoon, but what surprised him more was the uncharacteristic look on Woojin’s face – uncertain but determined.

It wasn’t a completely unreasonable expression, considering they’d never shared a proper conversation since Woojin’s first day on the force, apart from polite encounters along the hallways or necessary sharing of case information. Jihoon had never bothered to put anything as silly as a smile on his face for those exchanges either. It wasn’t like he _wanted_ to get along with Woojin.

It wasn’t just the matter of who Woojin was partnered with. It was that everyone _respected_ him right off the bat. Woojin simply had this rugged air to him, a fierceness to his gaze and a strength to his jaw that made him look courageous and competent. He looked like someone who could be trusted to hunt down a robber and not get beat up in the process (not that anyone had ever said that to Jihoon’s face, but still).

He didn’t look particularly competent right at that moment though. His bottom lip was caught between his teeth as he stared down at Jihoon, flashing that snaggletooth that always took anything frightening right out of the surrounding air, the muscles of his face seeming to have frozen into a nervous rictus of a grin.

It made Jihoon kind of want to laugh. No one had ever had that reaction to him; no one looked at Park Jihoon and thought _scary_.

All the same, he cocked an eyebrow and continued chewing as he stared Woojin in the eye, hoping that his expression was radiating as much suspicious scepticism as he was trying to convey.

Woojin shifted his weight from one foot to the other, and Jihoon couldn’t help staring at the convulsive movement of his throat as he swallowed nervously. He was holding something in his hands, Jihoon realised at last – a cardboard-brown box with black lettering on it that he couldn’t quite see unless he wanted to make his squinting obvious.

“Um, I heard it was your birthday,” Woojin blurted, startling Jihoon into letting his poker face go in favour of wide-eyed surprise. “It’s not much, but I got you something.” He stuck his hands out in a swift, violent motion, sticking the box right in front of Jihoon’s face, close enough that he could clearly read the word _MUG_ printed on it.

Jihoon blinked. “Thanks,” was all he said, blankly, as he leaned further back in his chair, staring up at Woojin in disbelief.

Woojin blinked rapidly, the box still sitting awkwardly in his hands. “Well, do you want to open it?”

Jihoon didn’t really mean to, but he felt his lip curl up very slightly in a very much sardonic way. “Sure,” he murmured, brows raising once more as he plucked the box out of Woojin’s grip and opened the top.

He pulled out a mug. What a surprise.

“I heard you had a dog,” Woojin started hastily, but Jihoon was no longer listening.

The mug was white, with a printed pattern of tiny cartoon dog heads of various breeds all around it. It was nice. It was _cute_.

Jihoon hated cute.

It was as if the insult had suddenly made him lose control of his own mouth. “Just because I have a baby face doesn’t mean I like cute stuff, you know,” he heard himself say, with just the right amount of disgust in his tone to make Woojin flinch. “But since this is a birthday gift, I’ll be sure to treasure it.”

He looked back up at Woojin with the sweetest, most insincere smile he had in his arsenal.

Woojin looked pale and wounded as he ducked his head and slunk away, the set of his shoulders seeming suddenly smaller from behind.

Jihoon’s mouth twisted slightly as he watched Woojin’s retreat, but the bitterness still eating at him swallowed down his apologies. He glanced at the mug again before replacing it in its box and stuffing it into his bag – he couldn’t very well toss it. It was a gift after all.

* * *

The two of them were most often the last to leave the station, working late into the night finishing up the most mundane of reports – traffic tickets, petty theft, shoplifting, false alarms. It was all part and parcel of being the most junior officers, the ones who didn’t have clearance to bring classified information home so they could slog in the comfort of their own beds like what the higher ranking officers did.

Woojin sat two cubicles diagonally down from Jihoon, and some nights when he looked up, blinking his tired eyes as he took a large gulp of too-strong coffee to keep himself going, Woojin’s seat would be perfectly placed for his gaze to land on.

It was oddly relaxing to watch Woojin type up his reports. He had this calm, unflappable way of working that made him seem rather gormless at times, especially when he stared at his screen with his mouth open while he was deep in thought. His eyes always seemed confused for long moments as he puzzled things out in his mind, before something would click and he would spring back into action, fingers moving across the keyboard with heavy, purposeful strokes.

Woojin hadn’t approached him again after that debacle on his birthday, not that Jihoon had taken particular notice – or cared, really. If he thought about it properly, Woojin was technically his only real rival at the station anyway. They would be fighting for the same promotions, the same cases, the same chances to prove themselves.

Friendship was absolutely impossible. Unthinkable.

Still, that didn’t stop Jihoon from watching Woojin late in the night. It was lulling, the sound of Woojin’s keyboard clacking away, to the point that Jihoon would find himself staring into thin air in Woojin’s general direction, his vision going fuzzy until he abruptly shook himself back to reality and got back to work.

And anyway, rival or not, Jihoon would have to be blind not to admit that Woojin had a nice side profile. He had a heavy sort of jaw, the kind that lent his aura additional gravity, but contrastingly soft-looking cheeks. Sometimes, Jihoon wondered what it would be like to touch those cheeks – but only very, very late at night and when he was very, very close to dozing off at his desk right there and then.

Once, they had bumped into each other in the pantry, Woojin clutching a mug of steaming tea in his hands just as Jihoon walked in, his coffee cup woefully empty. Woojin’s eyes had flickered to his and then away just as quickly, but Jihoon’s expression had been perfectly neutral. He didn’t care about Park Woojin right then – all he wanted was his damn coffee.

“Hi,” Woojin stammered, and then, “Sorry,” as he moved to the side, inching around Jihoon in his haste to get out of the way. It was comical, almost, the way he was keeping his distance, like a force field had spontaneously sprung up around Jihoon that he had to avoid at all costs.

Jihoon blinked at him tiredly, then turned away and padded over to the coffee machine, shutting his eyes while he waited for his mug to fill. By the time he was done, Woojin was already back at his desk, frowning at his screen with his brows drawn together, not giving the smallest sign that he was at all aware of Jihoon’s presence.

Jihoon thought about scowling, but if Woojin wasn’t going to see it, then what was the point really?

For the most part, though, Woojin and Jihoon managed to stay out of each other’s way. Not too difficult a feat, considering the size of the station and the stationary nature of their late-night work.

In fact, it was another few weeks before Woojn got around to almost breaking Jihoon’s nose by flinging the bathroom door open with his usual brutish enthusiasm. Jihoon had had to take a quick step back to avoid ruining his perfect nose bridge, his face creasing in disbelief at the sight of Woojin gawking stupidly at his proximity.

“Watch it,” he growled, and he squeezed past Woojin with a grunt before the other could so much as open his mouth to apologise. He felt Woojin try to twitch aside as he passed, but their shoulders still pressed together in the half-open doorway, Woojin’s fingers brushing briefly along his wrist before he finally pushed free.

Goosebumps sprang up all along his arm where he had touched Woojin, but he ignored them until they finally went away.

* * *

Jihoon liked his work, but that didn’t necessarily mean that he liked _being_ at work. Most of his superiors were nice enough to him, but cordiality could only take one so far. No one invited colleagues they were _cordial_ with for drinks, or housewarming parties, or tea break gossip sessions.

Work was lonely, and the loneliness made Jihoon bitter, which made him even nastier than usual, and all that resulted was that fewer people than ever bothered to give him anything but the most passing of greetings at the station.

Woojin, though – it was like every damn person within a hundred-metre radius was attracted to him like a bee to a flower.

If it wasn’t “Hey Park, coming for lunch?” it was “Drinks on me tonight, Park” or “Hey Park, over here – did you hear that…” It was almost as if a Park Jihoon who could potentially be confused with Park Woojin didn’t even exist.

Jihoon didn’t care.

The more time his colleagues spent fooling around was more effort put in by him to claw his way to the top, rung by rung. One day, he’d be the youngest detective in the entire city, and then they’d _all_ see what they’d been missing out on.

It was only when Woojin turned to glance in Jihoon’s direction rather quizzically from the corner of the station where he was chatting to Officer Kang that Jihoon realised he had been glaring fixedly in Woojin’s direction for the past five minutes while his thoughts ran rampant. Jerking his head away so quickly he cricked his neck, Jihoon sat ramrod straight, facing his monitor while blinking back tears of pain.

Six months. Six months was all it had taken to reduce Woojin to the only Park who mattered in the station.

The weird thing was that Jihoon had now spent a longer time at the precinct _with_ Woojin than without, and yet he continued to resent the other’s presence with every fibre of his being. Every time he saw him flash that snaggletooth at Detective Hwang, who could be counted on to laugh his silly laugh in response, it was all Jihoon could do not to run up to them and strangle Detective Hwang to death.

Although if he thought about it, he should really be murdering Woojin instead of one of his favourite colleagues. Sometimes homicidal urges didn’t make any sense.

“Um, Jihoon?” The hesitant voice knocked Jihoon out of his reverie, and he shivered slightly.

“What?” he snapped, looking up at Woojin – because of course it was him. Who else would it be? Detective Ha?

Woojin’s mouth opened stupidly for a moment, before he blurted out in a jumbled rush of syllables that Jihoon could barely understand, “We’re heading to the bar tonight – just a casual thing. Do you want to come? Drinks on me – it’s my birthday.” And then he smiled, small and bashful, and Jihoon felt his face heat in horror at that unfamiliar expression.

A cutting _no_ was on the tip of his tongue, but what he ended up saying was a very disgruntled, “Sure, whatever.”

It _was_ the kid’s birthday after all, even if he’d only just found out. Jihoon wasn’t that big of an asshole – nor was he an idiot who said no to free drinks.

* * *

Agreeing to go to the damn bar had been a mistake. Jihoon felt the wrongness of his decision in his bones less than half an hour after the drinking started.

Everyone was crowded around Woojin, hooting and hollering in amusement and various stages of drunkenness despite the early hour. The superior Park. The only Park who mattered.

God, how Jihoon hated him.

He downed the rest of his second shot and exhaled through his mouth, eyes watering slightly at the sting of the alcohol. He’d never had a particularly good tolerance for drinking, and he could already feel it hitting him, the heat of the crowded bar causing sweat to prickle on his back and under his arms. It felt disgusting, and he felt out of place.

It was probably time to head home.

Pushing through the few people still thronging Woojin, he grabbed the birthday boy by the shoulder and tugged him about roughly. Some of Woojin’s drink slopped onto his pants, but he seemed too startled by Jihoon’s sudden appearance to notice. Had he already forgotten inviting Jihoon? Typical.

“Just wanted to say happy birthday, and thanks for the drinks,” Jihoon said resentfully, feeling as if every word was being pulled harshly out of his gut. “I’m heading off first, but you have a good night.”

Woojin’s mouth fell open even wider than it already was, but Jihoon simply walked away and out of the building.

He was done.

But he hadn’t gotten more than three feet away from the front door before he heard an annoyingly-familiar voice calling his name, still with that undeniable Busan twang to it that Woojin was forever getting gently ribbed about.

Jihoon felt abruptly tired. He didn’t want to have to deal with Woojin again, but he turned around anyway, and if there wasn’t exactly fire in his eyes, there were at least a few sparking embers ready to be stoked.

“What is it, Park?” he sighed more than snapped, folding his arms against Woojin’s helter-skelter approach.

“I –” Woojin’s lashes fluttered as he blinked rapidly, the way he always did when he was nervous. “Did something happen? It’s just – you left so suddenly.” He looked bewildered, like he genuinely had no idea why Jihoon might have decided to leave early after being ignored by the man of the night for basically the entire night.

Jihoon stared at him, wondering how a person could be so utterly oblivious.

“I’m just not a drinking kind of guy, that’s all,” he said flatly, stuffing his hands in his pockets as he frowned at Woojin.

Woojin was looking away, at the brightly-lit diner across the street, his gaze distant before he finally turned back to Jihoon. There was something about the look in his eyes then that made the hair on Jihoon’s arms prickle terribly, a laser-sharp focus on him and him alone.

“Do you,” Woojin started, sucking in a quick breath, “like me?”

_What?_

Jihoon blinked, and his voice when it emerged from his throat sounded eerily calm. “No?” he said, and he hated the way it came out like a question, like he wasn’t at all sure whether or not he liked Park Woojin, like he hadn’t just spent the past six months hating the guy with his entire heart and soul.

Woojin shook his head, looking mortified. “It’s just that you’re always looking at me,” he stammered, just as stupid as the words coming out of his mouth.

Jihoon couldn’t believe his ears. “I don’t _look_ at you,” he protested, although it sounded feeble to his own ears. He should have said something like, _You must be mad, Park_ instead, something more amused and derisive. He shouldn’t have gone on the defensive all at once.

Woojin moved closer to him, the whites of his eyes showing in a way that made Jihoon want to snort inappropriately. He stood his ground, refusing to be cowed by Woojin’s nearing proximity, eyes narrowing even as Woojin halted with their noses less than a foot apart.

“Can I kiss you?”

It sounded pitiful, a hopelessly hopeful plea, and Jihoon almost didn’t understand exactly what was being asked at first. As if Woojin would ever ask to kiss him. As if _he_ would ever think about kissing Park Woojin.

“Are you completely insane?” he asked in return, just before he grabbed the collar of Woojin’s neatly-pressed shirt and pulled him closer.

The kiss was like sparks igniting, heat and anger and hatred all boiling together into a churning mess in Jihoon’s unsettled stomach as his fingers curled in Woojin’s hair. He growled against Woojin’s mouth, pushing and pushing and taking everything he could while everything was still his for the taking – the soft whine that started low in Woojin’s throat; the hand he wrapped about Jihoon’s waist, skin warm enough to make him burn; the soft strands sliding between his fingers as he tugged, hard enough to hurt; Woojin gasping into his mouth with every ragged breath rather than pull away for even a single moment.

It was exquisite and terrible all at the same time.

Jihoon’s chest was heaving when they finally broke apart, wiping his spit-wet mouth on his sleeve before he stared at Woojin with an incredulous expression. What had just happened?

Woojin looked like he didn’t even know who the hell Jihoon was anymore. He was starry-eyed and dazed, lips shiny and still slightly parted. He looked like a robot that had encountered a fatal malfunction and was currently rebooting.

“That was for your birthday,” Jihoon said, after a too-long moment of silence. “Since I didn’t get you a gift or anything.”

It was official. He had caught Woojin’s stupidity.

Woojin blinked, seeming to come back to life all of a sudden. “It’s past midnight. It’s not my birthday anymore,” he pointed out, seeming oddly triumphant about that fact.

Jihoon opened his mouth for half a second, and then shut it again. He felt like he had just fallen into the twilight zone, where Woojin wasn’t petrified at the sight of him and he was actually considering the fact that intense dislike might not be the only feeling he was harbouring for the other Park after all.

“I only live two blocks away,” Woojin said suddenly, one hand reaching out to grab on to Jihoon’s arm. He squeezed meaningfully, and Jihoon shivered at the sudden heat that flared all over his skin.

“Fine,” he said, as nonchalantly as he could, the side of his lips quirking at the surprise evident on Woojin’s face. He was seized with the sudden urge to kiss that dumb expression into oblivion, and he proceeded to do just that.

Woojin whimpered when Jihoon licked his way into his mouth, dark and forceful. He was already rather in love with that sound, and maybe it wasn’t such a long shot to say that he might come to be just as fond of the person who made it too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic was mightily confused about whether it wanted to be crack or angst, so now it's just kind of messed up and nothing makes sense. But hey, I finished it on time for the right day, so there's that!


	2. Chapter 2

Jihoon never thought of his less desirable actions as _mistakes_. Mistakes meant that whatever had happened should never have happened – but what if the experience had made him stronger? Better?

Instead, he thought of such instances as _lessons_ – experiences that weren’t necessarily pleasant but had to be gotten over with so he wouldn’t do the same dumb thing again.

Case in point – sleeping with Woojin the night after his birthday. A very important lesson.

He’d woken up the next morning to a very unwelcome shoulder-shaking, and had almost screamed when he’d opened his eyes to see none other than Park Woojin staring at him with furrowed brows.

“I’m awake,” Jihoon mumbled, and then promptly turned over in order to fall asleep again.

“What time is your shift? I have to leave in ten minutes,” Woojin said, plucking insistently at Jihoon’s shirt, “so you have to get up right now if you want a ride.”

Squinching his eyes tight shut, Jihoon took about three seconds to debate the pros and cons of following Woojin to work. It wasn’t a particularly contentious debate considering he had the same shift timing as Woojin, and he let out another groan at the realisation.

“Fine,” he hissed. “Shove off and go get me a toothbrush. I’m coming.”

He only started truly regretting his decision twenty minutes later.

“No, seriously. I think half the reason you’re so grumpy all the time is because you never have any breakfast,” Woojin said, in a tone of absolute seriousness. It was unsettling, the way he was suddenly talking to Jihoon like he knew him. Like they were friends and not just colleagues who occasionally drifted into the periphery of each other’s lives. Like he thought his opinion actually mattered to Jihoon.

 “I don’t get hungry in the mornings,” Jihoon muttered as he stared out of the car window at the passing blocks. “And I’m not _grumpy_ all the time.” He could barely believe he was even having a conversation about his consumption of breakfast (or lack thereof) with Park Woojin in the first place.

“Most of the time then,” Woojin relented, sounding amused, and Jihoon was seized with the sudden urge to smack him upside the head for that. “Just try this granola bar. It’ll change your life, I promise, and it’s healthy too. Here, it’s –”

“Just _drive_ ,” Jihoon said loudly, slapping Woojin’s hand away and shifting so that he was leaning up against the door, as far away as possible from the person he liked least in the entire world. “Just because we slept together once doesn’t give you the right to tell me what to do with my life, Park.”

Woojin’s hand dropped abruptly, making an audible thump when it hit the gear stick, and the overwhelming silence that followed made Jihoon’s skin prickle with discomfort. He wanted to take a peek at Woojin’s expression, but for some reason he found that he didn’t quite dare to.

Still, it wasn’t as if he had lied. The faster Woojin got it out of his head that what they’d done had meant something, the better.

Jihoon always made it a point never to have to learn the same lesson twice.

* * *

He didn’t see Woojin for the rest of the day.

It was a usual occurrence considering how often one or both of them were out of the station on various duties, but it made Jihoon feel strange anyway. Unresolved, almost. He couldn’t seem to stop fidgeting in his seat, and he was grateful that Detective Ong was clearly far too busy nursing what looked like the hangover of the decade to question him.

The day passed in a mundane sort of manner, in a way Jihoon had never experienced before. Suddenly, every quiet moment they spent driving around wasn’t automatically the quiet before the storm, the deceptive prelude to some major crime. Suddenly, the bustling crowds along the sidewalk during the morning peak hour weren’t a pickpocket’s haven waiting to happen but the sign of a city thriving with life.

He was definitely going mad.

He couldn’t stop thinking about the way his left shoulder ached slightly whenever he moved it, where Woojin had bitten down the night before, and none too lightly either. He’d caught a glimpse of the area in the morning, a ring of bruised red standing out flush against his tan skin, and the sight had left him feeling strangely queasy.

Woojin had tried to hold him too, right after. He’d just wriggled up to Jihoon like he belonged there, and would probably have proceeded to spoon him for the rest of the night had Jihoon not grunted in alarm at his sudden proximity and shifted away.

“What’re you doing?” he’d muttered, already half-asleep as he twisted away from the unwelcome touch. Woojin had made a soft, surprised noise in response, as if he hadn’t realised that Jihoon was still awake, but he hadn’t tried to get any closer again.

Jihoon had ended up waking in the middle of the night feeling cold and confused.

Did Woojin do that a lot? Did he make it a habit of cuddling with everyone he slept with? Jihoon hadn’t even pegged him for a one-night stand kind of guy in the first place – he’d seemed too serious, too sweetly puppy-like to throw himself into such an emotionless pastime.

He _was_ an astoundingly good kisser though.

“ – kid, hey. Kid. _Jihoon_.” Detective Ong’s voice cut sharply into his muddled thoughts, making him jump. “We’re being called in. Get your head in the game, yeah?”

Jihoon blinked slowly as the words sank in and turned to Detective Ong, shame-faced. “Yes, sir,” he mumbled, but the older man only laughed and patted him genially on the shoulder.

“Feelings can’t be fought, my dear Officer Park. The sooner you realise that, the less misery you’ll be putting yourself through,” Detective Ong said with a badly-concealed smirk on his face as he affected a rather unconvincing air of wisdom, as if he weren’t a mere four years older than Jihoon himself, and probably far less mature.

Jihoon flushed anyway, and refused to give Detective Ong the satisfaction of hearing him protest the situation. Not that there _was_ any situation to protest in the first place.

At any rate, the case they were called in to investigate turned out to be a false alarm, a case of mistaken identity and a wrongly-assumed break-in by a crotchety old lady who had misplaced her glasses. That was fine by Jihoon, because he spent at least ten minutes snickering about it later on with Detective Ong as they sipped on coffee during their break, and he managed not to think about the events of the previous night again for the rest of the day.

* * *

He managed to go without speaking to Woojin for exactly six days.

It was something of a feat considering the way they were stuck with each other most nights, but Jihoon was nothing if not stubborn. He absolutely refused to allow his ass to leave the chair for any reason at all, not until all of his reports were completed and he was able to walk right past Park Woojin and out the front entrance.

That meant no pee breaks, no coffee breaks, and especially no staring-at-Woojin breaks. None, zilch, nada.

It turned out to be far more difficult than he expected, but somehow Jihoon endured – at least until he was foiled by the other Park himself, who stopped by his desk on the seventh night with a fresh mug of steaming coffee in his hands and a look on his face that would’ve been better suited on someone who was walking knowingly into an occupied bear cave.

For a whole three seconds, Jihoon thought about leaping up from his chair and running to the bathroom, but there was really no logical reason for him to be doing that. He wasn’t _scared_. Instead, he narrowed his eyes harder at his screen, focusing on the black text until it swam before his eyes, as if Woojin might disappear from his side if he pretended not to notice him.

As if he had ever had a jot of luck around here.

“Hey,” Woojin said softly, his tone so hesitant that Jihoon couldn’t help responding out of sheer sympathy – he’d have to be some sort of heartless beast not to. Letting out an audibly exasperated sigh from his nose, he swung his chair around to glare at Woojin. Perhaps one day he would finally figure out exactly why it was that their station’s star rookie acted so tragically pathetic around Jihoon alone.

“I’m busy, in case you couldn’t tell,” he said flatly, folding his arms as his lips twisted into a frown of disapproval.

Woojin’s mouth half-opened stupidly. “Sorry,” he said at last, after a painfully long pause.

Jihoon sighed again, more tiredly this time as he rubbed at the corner of his eye with his hand. “So?” he prompted impatiently. “Are you ever going to give me that coffee? Or are you just here to tempt me by waving it beneath my nose?”

Woojin raised a brow ever so slowly. “Tempt…you?” he repeated, looking bizarrely bedazzled at the thought.

Jihoon promptly choked on his own spit and began to splutter, shaking his head with enough violence to startle the dopey look off Woojin’s face. “ _Mock_. I meant mock, as in are you here to mock me with your cup of coffee that smells exactly the way I like to make it,” he corrected aggressively, his voice echoing far too loudly in the open space for his liking.

Woojin grinned at that, and Jihoon once again felt unduly threatened by the sight of that peeking snaggletooth.

“No, this _is_ for you. I wouldn’t be that mean.” Woojin chuckled as he set the cup down beside Jihoon’s half-empty one.

“That’s nice,” Jihoon said, in that same blank manner he always adopted whenever he had no idea how to respond to someone strange, because if it were up to him, he would certainly be that mean. Gloating was ever so pleasing for the soul after all.

He expected that to be the end of their somewhat random and uncalled for encounter, but Woojin simply stood there motionless for the next few seconds while Jihoon stared pointedly at his coffee, wondering what it would take for the idiot to finally leave him in peace. How obvious did he have to make it that he didn’t want to talk to Woojin? That he didn’t even particularly like Woojin all that much?

“Hey,” Woojin said once more, in that small, pitiful voice. “Can we talk?”

Jihoon felt all the hairs on the back of his neck stand up at those three simple words, and he would’ve closed his eyes and prayed for patience had Woojin not been standing over him like a hawk.

“I don’t think there’s anything for us to talk about,” he said stiffly, refusing to look Woojin in the eye.

There was another long, uncomfortable pause, and then a confused-sounding, “Oh” that made Jihoon’s head hurt.

“Look,” he said, standing and turning so that he was face-to-face with Woojin, “that night – it can’t happen again. We’re working together. We’re – I don’t know, we’re not even friends. I don’t know what delusion you’ve been labouring under but I definitely do _not_ like you in any way. Okay? No offense, Park, but we can’t be doing this.”

In the back of his mind, he wished Woojin would take a step back instead of looming over him right at his desk, but at the same time he wasn’t too surprised that the other Park had absolutely no sense of personal space or common sense. That was what had gotten them into this mess in the first place, wasn’t it? (Sure, he was the one who had initiated the kiss, but still.)

“But we _could_ be friends. I like you,” Woojin protested, reaching out to grab hold of Jihoon’s hand in an abrupt move that made him jump. “And I thought – I mean, I liked the way you said my name that night.” His voice trailed off in an appalling display of shyness, and Jihoon almost wept at how humiliated he felt.

“Why on earth would you say something like that?” he half-muttered to himself in horror, a shiver running up his spine at the memory.

Woojin blinked guilelessly, his expression so intimately soft that Jihoon felt like he was intruding into a scene he himself belonged in. “It’s just – you never call me by my name at work,” he said with a pleased shrug of his shoulders.

Jihoon groaned. “You just said the answer yourself. I don’t call anyone by their name at work, dumbass.” Annoyed, he tried to pull his hand out of Woojin’s grip, but all he succeeded in doing was pulling the other even closer. He could feel the heat radiating off Woojin’s chest, see the nervous flare of his nostrils and the way the ends of his lips winged upwards as if in a constant urge to smile.

For a moment, Jihoon forgot how to breathe. He planted his free hand on the table behind him, bracing himself, and when Woojin leaned down, their noses brushing just a moment before their lips met, he didn’t move away.

* * *

Jihoon took on his first homicide case in early December, accompanied by none other than Detective Ha.

It was all he could do not to squeal in excitement as they were on their way to the crime scene and he was in the passenger seat beside, in his opinion, the finest detective on the force right then – he could only imagine how inappropriate _that_ would seem.

He trotted eagerly up the poorly-maintained garden path behind the shorter man, eyes wide as he took in the utterly dilapidated house before them. It could hardly even be called a house – a shack, perhaps, its windows smashed and cracked bricks half falling out of the walls. He hadn’t even known that was possible.

The smell hit him the moment they entered, not just the usual dull mustiness of a residence long abandoned, but the thick stench of dried blood, fouler than anything he had ever smelled before. He hesitated a few steps in, just long enough for Detective Ha to notice and glance back at him with a faintly furrowed brow.

Throwing his shoulders back, Jihoon fixed his face into what he hoped was a thoroughly unbothered expression and forged forward. It wasn’t as if the place was scary – there were other cops and professionals bustling about, setting up the perimeter and carting in various large, complicated-looking pieces of equipment. It just felt discomfiting, to know that someone had met their violent end here, and in a place that had fallen into such disrepair.

“You, stay here,” Detective Ha said suddenly as they neared the doorway of what Jihoon assumed to be the main scene of the crime. “Don’t beat yourself up about it if you lose your lunch. Most first-timers do, but that doesn’t mean I want you kids contaminating the evidence.” He turned and directed a wry smile Jihoon’s way, the tiny gesture of friendliness effectively destroying any token resistance that he had been thinking of putting up.

Still, he was pretty sure he’d seen enough gruesome photos while logging evidence to be immune to anything that could be in that room.

The body was in the corner, limbs sprawled messily like a discarded marionette, lying untouched where she had fallen. Her neck was tilted upwards, face directed towards the single window as if yearning for escape, and Jihoon wondered if the last thing she had seen had been the face of her killer, or the velvet blue sky with its sliver of moon.

He felt – sickened. That something like this had happened in this day and age, in a city under the watchful eyes of a team he was part of. That life could be ripped so senselessly from someone with such a long, unknowable future ahead of them.

He didn’t puke, but he came close, and even the small, sad smile that Detective Ha gave him as they reached the station late in the afternoon did little to calm his frazzled nerves.

Woojin wheeled his chair across to him minutes after he had gotten seated, eyes wide with interest as he whispered, “How was it? Your first homicide investigation?”

Jihoon shifted away, shoulder twitching as he blinked furiously at his screen. “It was fine. Just a regular homicide,” he said curtly, and immediately felt bad for saying that, for reducing the victim to just another statistic.

“Was it…bad?” Woojin asked, as realisation settled over him, his posture stiffening a little as uncertainty took over his expression.

Jihoon shot him an angry sideways glance. “Wasn’t yours bad? Your first one?” he said impatiently, wishing Woojin would just get out of his hair for once in his life. He wasn’t in the mood to banter, not right then.

But Woojin only got a funny bewildered look on his face as he said slowly, “I’ve never been on a homicide case. Sungwoon hyung keeps saying I’m not ready yet. That’s why I’m asking you.”

Jihoon blinked, struck dumb for a long moment. “You’ve – what?” he said, his tongue stiff in his mouth as he whipped around to stare Woojin in the face. “But I thought – I mean, he thinks you’re the best damn thing since sliced bread. In terms of us newbies, anyway. I figured he’d been having you crack cases with him since forever ago.”

Woojin laughed at that, a kind sort of laugh – the one that said, fondly, _Oh, how misguided you are, Park Jihoon_. “I’m just there to do the grunt work. And the paperwork. I’ve never been allowed into a homicide scene before.” He paused, cocking his head as he eyed Jihoon for a moment. “But you cleared that robbery case last month, and the high-profile one involving the conman, remember? They must be moving you on to better things now.”

The tone of Woojin’s voice was so odd and so unexpected that Jihoon couldn’t identify it at first. He sounded bothered, unhappy even, with just the faintest hint of pettiness thrown in.

“Are you,” Jihoon breathed, feeling a sudden rush of triumph fill his chest, “ _jealous_ , Park?”

Woojin laughed again, but once more there was that strange look on his face, like he didn’t quite understand Jihoon’s point. “Of course I am,” he said, perfectly matter-of-fact. “I’m jealous of you quite a lot, you know. You’re so good at what you do.”

Jihoon shook his head and let out an awkward half-laugh. “You must be kidding,” he scoffed, scowling as he turned away. He could already feel his ears starting to flush red, and he wished Woojin would stop messing with him in every way possible – with his words, his body, even his voice.

“I would never kid with you,” Woojin assured him, with a too-bright glimmer of amusement in his dark eyes. Jihoon’s stomach did a sudden flip, but whether it was out of annoyance at being made fun of or just some other obscure reason, he wasn’t too sure.

“Shove off,” he grumbled, his face as hot as an oven and possibly just as bright. “I hate you, Park. I hope you know that. I really hate you.”

* * *

He didn’t though. Not always, anyway.

Not when Woojin cornered him in the pantry late, late at night with that sweet, hungry look on his face. Not when Woojin began to waltz over to his desk in the evenings with a box of fried chicken for dinner. Certainly not when Woojin was straddling him on the bed, breaths puffing hot and fast against Jihoon’s neck.

There had been a line at some point, some fixed demarcation between liking someone and sleeping with them simply because they were a fantastic kisser, but Jihoon had a feeling he had long since crossed it. He wasn’t even particularly sure the line had been all that clear in the first place.

Jihoon didn’t like it, but then again Jihoon was the kind of person who didn’t like very many things.

Once upon a time, he hadn’t liked Park Woojin. Now, he spent far too much time disliking the fact that he didn’t _actually_ dislike Woojin to really continue his baseless vendetta.

“Hey!”

He groaned at the sound of Woojin’s voice, far too loud and excited for any hour before noon even at a distance, and regretted not kicking the idiot out of his house the night before.

“Hey,” Woojin repeated excitedly, trampling back into the room like a stampede of angry zebras. “You actually kept it. You like it, right?” Reluctantly, eager to avoid being shaken until his brains fell out of his ears, Jihoon cracked his eyelids open an inch to see what exactly Woojin was talking about.

Ah, the cup he had received for his birthday.

“It’s just a mug,” Jihoon muttered, shutting his eyes again. “I wouldn’t throw away a perfectly good mug.” At any rate, there was also a little Schnauzer face on it that looked like Max, and that had effectively destroyed any chances of Jihoon ever throwing that mug into the trash unless it broke into a million unfixable pieces.

“Well, there’s coffee in this perfectly good mug,” Woojin said, sounding ridiculously pleased for no good reason at all.

Jihoon heard the soft thud of the mug being set down on the dresser, the delicious whiff of the promised coffee making his lashes flutter in interest. The next moment, he felt the bed sink rather alarmingly as Woojin crawled onto it and proceeded to stretch himself out over Jihoon like a disgustingly over-sized feline, half-crushing him in the process. His cheek was tucked lightly against Jihoon’s, face pressing into the pillow as he relaxed with a soft sigh, leaving Jihoon whining and protesting ineffectually beneath him.

“You’re _heavy_ ,” Jihoon grunted, his breath somehow barely managing to leave his body as he pushed at Woojin’s limp shoulder. “I hate you so much.”

Woojin chuckled at that for some reason, and he turned his head to nuzzle lazily at Jihoon’s face until their lips finally found each other. Jihoon reacted sleepily, pressed into the bed by Woojin’s weight, eyes half-lidded as he let Woojin kiss him with slow, languid strokes of his tongue. His hand found its way underneath Woojin’s over-sized shirt, fingers brushing the angles of his hip and the planes of his stomach.

He felt Woojin quiver beneath his touch, like he was itching to burst out of his skin, and Jihoon almost purred as he allowed himself to enjoy the power he held at his fingertips. Not teasing with intention, but just exploring, learning the way Woojin’s muscles moved with every motion, the tiny raised scar just to the left of his navel, the stiffening of his entire back with just a single brush along his thigh – Jihoon was determined to map it all.

The coffee was very cold indeed by the time Jihoon got around to tasting it, but he had Woojin to make him another cup anyway.

* * *

Curiously, it was Officer Kang who invited Jihoon to the unofficial precinct New Year’s Eve party before Woojin did. Jihoon hadn’t really known what to make of it, but Woojin’s expression when he had found out had been priceless.

“It’s not like he invited me on a date or something,” Jihoon scoffed. “All he did was tell me the place and the time. Everyone’s going to be there – even you, I presume.”

Woojin wrinkled his nose in a manner that was, Jihoon thought, objectively adorable. “You’re the one who always says no one invites you anywhere,” he huffed. “I thought I was going to get to be the one to tell you.”

Jihoon rolled his eyes. “Stop being childish,” he said coolly, and stepped away from Woojin right as Detective Hwang walked into the pantry.

The senior officer’s smile was suspiciously placid, and Jihoon’s worst fears were only confirmed when he proceeded to say quite calmly, “Oh, don’t stop on my account, you two.”

Jihoon had never vacated a room quite so quickly.

Woojin, on the other hand, found the entire scene supremely amusing, and ended up spending most of the party begging Jihoon for a kiss.

“Just one,” he wheedled, in a way that was enough to make Jihoon want to cringe and disappear simply by virtue of being a recipient of such a display. “Everyone already knows anyway.”

Jihoon winced at the very unnecessary reminder. “If everyone already knows, then what’s the point of confirming it for them?” he said grumpily, shouldering Woojin away before he could press even closer. “I don’t know about you, but being the source of office gossip has never been a goal in life for me.”

“The only reason people will be gossiping about you will be because you caught that link Detective Ong missed last week and ended up solving the entire case,” Woojin said cheerily. “You do know they’re all placing bets on which of us is going to make detective first?”

The small smile that had been forming on Jihoon’s face faltered. “Well, probably you, I suppose,” he said flatly.

“Well –” Woojin started before breaking off, suddenly awkward in the face of Jihoon’s cold response. His shoulders drooped, and Jihoon had to hold back the untimely and inappropriate urge to splash the rest of his drink in Woojin’s face just to get him to perk up once more.

“Let’s just not talk about work,” Jihoon said neutrally, leaning his chin on his palm and looking out at the rest of his colleagues enthusiastically making a fool of themselves. It was the best he could give as a peace offering.

“Alright.” Woojin shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot, giving them a rare moment of quiet as he stared down at the half-finished drink in his hand.

It felt unsettling. Jihoon wasn’t used to Woojin being uncomfortable around him, not since that very first day he’d transferred over, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and hateful.

“Just one,” he said after a moment, clearing his throat and setting his glass down.

Woojin looked startled. “Just one what?” he asked, but Jihoon could see the moment the answer hit him right as the last word left his mouth, the dawning of shocked anticipation in his suddenly-bright eyes.

Jihoon smirked and pulled him forward, winding a hand about Woojin’s neck as he pressed himself upwards, lips parting eagerly even before they reached Woojin’s. He could feel his own pulse racing, the heady thrill of excitement making him light-headed with desire. He couldn’t remember ever feeling this way before, not before Park Woojin.

Someone hooted when Woojin wrapped an arm about Jihoon’s waist, their bodies moulding together, sleek and sinuous, but neither Jihoon nor Woojin heard it.

The clock struck midnight moments later, and the new year burst noisily into existence, but neither of them heard that either. Or perhaps they did, and there was simply no one else they would rather be kissing right then.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me: I think I need another chapter to resolve this properly.  
> Also me: Hm let's end this when they're still in the fwb stage.
> 
> Well, they'll get there someday! I also don't even know why I wrote this chapter. I'm sorry OTL


End file.
